Old Man! Are You Raising Hamsters Here?!

The next morning.

Konoha was still bright and pleasant, and the Uchiha Compound basked in the gentle morning light.

Izumi Uchiha jolted awake from her sleep, fine beads of sweat still dotting her forehead.

She had spent far too long in the genjutsu world, and as a result, she had nightmares all night. Every time she woke with a start, she feared she was still trapped in that world and would have to endure the pain of her clan's massacre again.

That torment plagued her for the entire night.

As she washed up, the girl in the mirror had faint shadows beneath her eyes, while the beauty mark beside her eye lent her an even more delicate charm.

When she arrived in the living room, she found a prepared breakfast of miso soup and rice balls on the table, along with a note pinned beneath them.

[I'm off to work, Izumi. Do your best too—Love, Mom]

Her fingertips brushed over the note, and warmth flooded her heart, washing away much of the nightmare of the massacre night.

After breakfast, Izumi put on her ninja forehead protector, checked her equipment, and headed out for her squad's meeting point, ready to carry out missions with her teammates and instructor.

The Uchiha Compound was peaceful and beautiful. Some of the elderly residents who had remained behind even greeted Izumi warmly.

Yet that peace made Izumi clutch her ninja tool pouch tighter.

"So what exactly is that mysterious person trying to do?"

After leaving the compound, Izumi could not help recalling everything she had experienced in Infinite Cycle of the Uchiha Massacre Night.

As a member of the Uchiha clan, Izumi naturally knew genjutsu and had received training from her elders on how to use the Sharingan.

However, the genjutsu she had learned mainly affected an individual's senses. For example, the Hell Viewing Technique merely made someone see the most terrifying scene in their heart.

But the genjutsu scenario purchased by that mysterious person last night had been practically a real world.

Izumi had "died" many times without finding a single flaw in the genjutsu world, only stubbornly believing that she was still trapped within it.

The entire genjutsu world seemed confined to the Uchiha Compound and the Konoha Military Police Force. The moment she left that area, masked Konoha ninja would intercept and kill her.

Izumi had heard of those masked ninja before. They were Anbu ninja under the Hokage.

But why would the Anbu seal off the Uchiha Compound?

"Morning, Izumi." A clear voice interrupted her thoughts.

Izumi looked up and saw Shisui Uchiha, dressed in a black short-sleeved high-collared shirt and black pants, brown armor strapped to his right shoulder, greeting her gently.

"Good morning, Brother Shisui." When Izumi had moved back to the compound with her mother, everything had been unfamiliar to her, and Shisui had helped her.

Shisui was gentle with everyone, and he had cared for the newly arrived Izumi as though she were his little sister.

"Didn't sleep well?" Shisui walked alongside Izumi since they were headed the same way, and his keen eye noticed her complexion.

"No... it's just..." Izumi did not know how to explain it.

She remembered seeing Clan Head Fugaku and his wife murdered by Itachi in the "Massacre Night," and seeing Uncle Yashiro, Uncle Tekka, and the others murdered by the mysterious masked man at the Konoha Military Police Force.

But when she thought carefully about it, Shisui had been the only one she had never seen.

"If you're feeling too tired, take a proper break once in a while." Shisui thought Izumi was simply having trouble adapting to the intensity of ninja missions after recently graduating as a Genin.

Izumi opened her mouth, but in the end, she still could not say it.

Was she supposed to tell Shisui that, in the genjutsu world, she had seen Itachi and a mysterious person slaughter the entire Uchiha clan?

And that Konoha's Anbu had sealed off the area outside the compound, blocking information and hunting down the surviving Uchiha?

"Mm, I'll get myself sorted out!" Izumi forced a smile in response to Shisui.

"Don't push yourself too hard." Shisui stopped walking. He had arrived at the Konoha Military Police Force.

After they parted, Izumi kept looking back. As she watched Uchiha clan members enter and leave the police building, it all felt strangely unreal.

Even after meeting up with her teammates and carrying out low-level missions under their Special Jonin instructor—pulling weeds, clearing clogged rivers, catching pets for noblewomen, and the like—Izumi remained absentminded.

At the Hyuga Compound, the morning scenery resembled an exquisitely detailed ukiyo-e painting.

Hinata sat in seiza on a cushion, a lacquered tray arranged before her like a delicate miniature garden.

Two slices of salmon rested neatly against the edge of a bowl of miso soup, accompanied by a small bowl of rice and a small dish containing several pieces of fruit. That was her breakfast.

"I'm full!" Hinata set down her bowl and chopsticks. Although about a quarter of the food remained, she had been taught the clan's etiquette since childhood, and everything had rules.

"Don't force yourself, okay?" Hinata's mother looked over with a smile.

Her father, Hyuga Hiashi, held his bowl as he contemplated something, failing to notice his daughter's condition.

Hinata had just been about to say something else when another voice sounded in her mind.

"You've never actually eaten your fill, have you?" Big Sister Hinata took control of their body.

"Big Sis... don't do this..." In their mental world, Little Hinata hurriedly tried to stop her sister, afraid that she would do something outrageous again.

Big Sister Hinata said in a low voice, "Last time, Menma told me that you have a huge appetite. I'd never noticed it before, so... you've never eaten enough, have you?"

"Big Sis..."

"I overlooked it. I'm sorry. Leave the rest to me."

When Hinata opened her eyes again, her entire bearing had changed. The timidity in her Byakugan was gone, replaced by a fierce, confident defiance.

Hinata's mother immediately noticed the change in her daughter.

She knew very well about her daughter's unusual condition, but before she could ask anything, Hinata cried out, "Old man! Are you raising hamsters here?!"

Crack—

The bowl in Hiashi's hand split with spiderweb-like cracks.

His Byakugan rose solemnly as he looked at Hinata.

If it had been any other member of the Hyuga clan, they would already have begun to tremble under the clan head's gaze.

But Big Sister Hinata was deeply dissatisfied with her father. "Bring two more servings... no, make that five!"

"I train so hard every day, and you still don't let me eat enough! Are you afraid I'll eat you out of house and home?"

Big Sister Hinata's sharp tongue was like a barrage of kunai, each one striking Hiashi squarely in the chest.

This little padded jacket was not only made of black cotton—it leaked in the wind too.

"Hinata, is that any way to speak to your father?" Hinata's mother spoke up.

She first instructed a servant to bring Hinata more food, then slowly rose, walked to Hinata's side, and gently embraced her daughter. "If something's bothering you, tell your mother about it."

To her, as a mother, both Little Hinata and the fiery-tempered Hinata were her daughters.

Besides, it felt as though she had raised two daughters with completely different personalities. It was rather interesting.

"Mom..." Big Sister Hinata felt her mother's warmth and hesitated for a moment.

Her mother in this world treated her very well. Although Hiashi was constantly mocked and had his authority as a father challenged, he was also very tolerant of her.

But she had parents and a family in that world too.

She was gradually beginning to understand what Menma meant when he kept saying, "This isn't real."